


a breeze off the hudson

by burnsidesjulia



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Other, duel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-01
Updated: 2016-06-01
Packaged: 2018-07-11 12:38:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7051846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnsidesjulia/pseuds/burnsidesjulia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Hamilton’s hands rise slowly to the swell of his ribcage. His nimble, brilliant fingers grope and-- Oh. Oh dear god, no. His hands come away red, shiny slippery red and he falls once more, so unceremoniously, this time forward and onto his knees.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> <br/> in which he is not escorted away, and burr is by hamilton's side when he takes his final breath.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a breeze off the hudson

“Gah!”

Burr turns his head over his shoulder, gazing toward the place of the outcry. His second, William P. Van Ness is straightening his coat in a tizzy, his mouth flying rapidly. He turns his body to walk away, but keeps talking toward Nathaniel, who has turned an unpleasant shade of red. He makes a similar noise of disgust, spits at the ground, and walks back.

“Nathaniel Pendleton is a horror. The worst judge from here all the way back to New York. I cannot stand him.” William’s voice is all huff, anger rouging his cheeks dangerously. His face shines over the coloring, a thin sheen of sweat sticking his clothes to his body. It is a hot morning, near the beginning of July, and even though the sun had yet to crest over the horizon, it is almost unbearably warm. Van Ness is still blathering on about Pendleton when Burr places a silencing hand on his shoulder. “William.” His voice comes out fairly sturdy, surprising him. It seems to surprise his second as well, as his mouth drops open once more before closing. Burr nods. “My pistol?” Van Ness nods enthusiastically, holding out the pistol Burr had already selected. Burr takes it and turns his back again, arm instinctively flying out into shooting position. His arm swings easily through the air. This would all be over soon.

On the other side of the dueling grounds, Hamilton shifts his glasses up his face. He mops his sweaty forehead with his palm. Early morning sun was the worst enemy to his already shoddy eyesight, so many nights spent hunched over a paper directly by a candle, so close he’d come away with wax on his sleeves. That and an entirely irrational sleeping schedule, plus a possible family history that he’d never be sure of, robbed him of his more powerful sight in his early thirties. So he’d brought the glasses. He knew how Eliza would worry already, when she awoke and found him gone, so to follow her advice about always carrying his lenses with him was to create a way to make himself seem more innocent. Not to worry, though. He promised himself he’d make it home before she ever opened her eyes.

Burr keeps catching glints from Hamilton’s eyeglasses flying across the ground, catching the small bit of light present in the air. They’ve been standing there, in wait for so long. They’d spoken briefly when they both arrived, but it had been short and nothing much came of it. They’d both bowed, an unemotional ‘Mister Vice President’ from Alexander and a slightly too eager, ‘Mister Hamilton, sir,’ from Burr before they chose their pistols and allowed their seconds to meet. Burr’s hand is heavy with the weight of the pistol. He wasn’t scared as he walked onto the field. He’s been here before, as a second and a dueler, though rarer being the latter. He wasn’t scared as he bowed to Hamilton, said his last polite words to the man. He wasn’t scared of the man until slid his glasses from his coat pocket and secured them on his nose. They’d both been in the war, both fought their best and contributed to the Revolution’s eventual victory. But anyone, even Burr, knew that Hamilton fought a better fight. He’d been one of Washington’s aides-de-camp, a group Burr was denied the chance to, and led the troops to a victory at Yorktown. So much of the army’s success was his doing. Hamilton was a better shot without his glasses; with them, his aim was deadly.

“We will put you through your paces, gentlemen. The best of luck to both of you.” That is Pendleton speaking, and Burr almost laughs despite the graveness in his voice and his own shaking knees. While Van Ness may be a close friend, he may have been better off as someone to back his presidential campaign and nothing more. He is also in the middle of the field, beside Pendleton and ready to direct them through, but he is standing rigid and not speaking. In fact, he is glaring daggers at the other man, and seemingly not willing to cooperate with Pendleton at all if he were going to take the lead. He’s formed a grudge over a fight that was not his to fight. He’s too emotional. Burr has always subscribed to the school of thought that believed that strong emotions, opinions, and loud words were the three ingredients to an early death. That’s what had killed Colonel Laurens so long ago. It had killed many of Burr’s other friends, too. Despite his beliefs of things that would get you killed, Hamilton possessed all three in amplitude, and is standing well and alive on the other side of the field. He has always been the one thing that never had followed Burr’s rules. He is the one thing that foiled Burr’s otherwise flawless plans. 

Van Ness is still scowling at Pendleton. Truly, he is a less competent second than Alexander’s. Hamilton has always been two steps ahead of him, he supposes. It seems fitting. 

“One!”

Burr takes his first step. He wishes he knew what Hamilton is thinking in this moment. He hopes his history of clumsiness doesn’t come back to write the final chapter and he trips now. How embarrassing, he thinks. What a terrible way to forfeit the only duel that mattered.

“Two!”

Burr’s other foot swings forward, and he tries to see into the other man’s brain. This is a man who has singlehandedly ruined his chance at the presidential seat. He had no real reason, he was just spiteful. Anything to watch Aaron Burr crash and burn, even if it meant backing Thomas Jefferson. Burr’s hand tightens fiercely around the butt of his pistol; _I am not immoral. I have beliefs. It is simply because they aren’t the same as his that he dismisses them._

“Three!”

From afar, he hears Alexander’s shuffling footsteps over his own. What a strange last few moments to spend in sync. He hopes he never hears from Hamilton ever again. He will move his law practice as far away as he can, he decides. He’ll flee to Virginia, if it takes that much. Hamilton would never go there.

“Four!”

Burr switches the pistol back and forth between his hands. His right is dominant, but his left is sturdier. He settles with his left eventually. Burr does not aim to kill. He aims to shock, to knock the last bit of sense that Hamilton has in his head into a spot where it just may be able to shine. He knows it is there. Alexander truly is a genius. He just acts without thought.

“Five!”

Not that Hamilton has no reason to act impulsively, now. Laying with Maria Reynolds was an unexcusable offense, sure, and there was no real reason behind it but selfish want. But now, when he turns his back on Burr, his oldest friend, it cannot be done entirely out of spite. No man is so evil. It must be, Burr decides, because of the loss of his son. He knows Alexander lost his mother to a fever and that his father lost himself, so he was an orphan too. And to add on, his eldest son killed in a duel. It sickens Burr. He wonders how Hamilton is holding himself so tall and proud on same side of a gun, the same gun that Philip stood behind just five years earlier when he died on this very field.

“Six!”

Burr only met Philip once, when he was nine. He was elected into the senate, and Alexander came after his head. The two met briefly outside of their law building, Hamilton swearing against his name and sure that it was personal slander. The meeting was actually quite odd, Burr thinks. They’d been interrupted in the peak of it, just as he’d lost his patience enough to tell Hamilton that he was crooked and that all of upstate New York would agree. Eliza had floated down the street, always the grace of a Schuyler, tugging a child with a mess of curly hair by the hand beside her. She’d so smoothly calmed Alexander’s mind, one hand curled around his forearm as she spoke to Burr like an old friend. She recognized him from the ball, from all the countless encounters and doubtlessly the stories Alexander told at home. She even knew of his wife and daughter. In fact, she’d asked about his family, seemed entirely interested and delivered a heartfelt apology about his wife’s sickly condition. The curly-haired boy she had in tow, that was Philip, had seemed delighted that he had a daughter the same age that he was. A daughter who also spoke three languages, and who had a lawyer for a father. He was a bright young man, and a pity to lose so soon. He was charming at the age of nine. He would’ve made just as good a lawyer as his father. Eliza had tugged both Philip and his father away, and behind his cockiness and his over the shoulder sneers that he directed back at Burr, Alexander seemed almost happy to be with his cozy little family. That was when Theodosia was still alive.

“Seven!”

Theodosia had died too young, too soon. She was a golden goddess, blocked out by the clouds. She was a flame that flickered out too soon. Only for twelve years they’d been married, only one child they’d had, and then she was too ill to bear another. Burr wanted a large family, if he were to be honest. He wanted a lifetime of love with his Theodosia. He still wants it. She’d deserved better. The world had deserved better. The world had never deserved her in the first place.

With Theodosia gone, the young Theo was left entirely under Burr’s care. God, he loves his daughter. He gives her everything, cares for her his very best. He’d give his life to keep his daughter well in less than a heart’s beat. However, if he were to die, she’d be orphaned. Burr knows the bitter sting of being left alone in the world. It changes you. He would give everything for his daughter, now his only Theodosia, but to give everything would be to take it all from her.

“Eight!”

 _If I die this morning, I will never see my Theo again._ The thought strikes him curiously, with no warning, no slow build of putting the pieces together. He has spent the past seven steps thinking of Hamilton, of his own slow shuffle and how he aims so sharply. Only now does his mind return to his daughter. She is only twenty-three this June, still so young and so vulnerable. She only married five years prior. Burr cannot think of her suffering the sort of loss that Hamilton did, that he himself did, be she older than the both of them or not. She lost her mother too soon. She cannot lose her father now. Burr swiftly moves his gun back to his right hand. The duel was not to kill before, and now it is not to shock. Now, he aims to disarm. Disarm or disable or not allow the man on the other side to strike him. Alexander will not be the thing to orphan Aaron Burr’s daughter. Only time itself will be allowed that privilege.

“Nine!”

Burr has been a second alongside Hamilton, before. He served for Charles Lee, Hamilton for John Laurens. Both of those men perished many years ago now, but the memory rings fresh in Burr’s mind. During the war, they’d met in the middle of the field, tried to solve the dispute. Hamilton did not want it solved, clearly, likely to please the awaiting Laurens. John had always had an itchy trigger finger, even his Excellency, General Washington, had thought so. And just that is what got him killed. And now, Burr is the one who stands behind the gun. His hand squeezes around the trigger, just enough pressure as to not shoot, but to be immediately prepared. This is all almost over.

Burr does not want to shoot Hamilton. But Hamilton, with his glasses gleaming in the newborn sunlight, clearly does not agree. This is necessity. This is a simple case of him or me. Hamilton has had his share. Burr refuses to let it be _him_ , ever again. 

“Ten!”

Burr’s feet freeze. His arm swings out.

“Fire!”

He hears his trigger squeeze. He thinks he hears Hamilton’s too, and it takes a moment of staring into blackness for him to realize he has closed his eyes. He opens them to nothingness. The world is standing still. Van Ness and Pendleton are nowhere in sight, the doctor’s back is turned, Hamilton is standing still on the other side of the field. His shot missed. He _missed_. Burr is almost giddy with the thought, and considers taunting him when- oh. He follows the man’s arm up, up, up, to where his pistol smokes toward the sky. He did hear his trigger pull, but he didn’t miss. Hamilton threw away his shot.

How _dare_ he. How dare he take the one time, the one time Burr allowed himself to act impulsively, and think he could be the sensible one? Christ, if anything Burr ever did was considered personal slander, it wouldn’t hold a candle to this. He wants to absolutely throw a fit. Even worse, Hamilton just stands still and quiet on the other side of the battlefield. His arm is still thrown skyward.

Suddenly, Alexander is moving again. His hands drop to his sides, bent slightly at the elbows, and he’s slumping forward at the shoulders, ducking his head toward his toes. His glasses slide off his sweat-slick face and into the dirt. He’s bowing his head in defeat. _Good_ , Burr thinks violently, his hand still twitching around the trigger. Honestly, he’s tempted to shoot again, aim for the ground beside the man’s feet or perhaps directly for his head. _To hell with him. To hell, and never come back._

Pendleton is creeping in from the edge of the field. He seems worried, vaguely confused, and the doctor follows from a ways back with the same expression. Van Ness is still standing off to Burr’s side. Neither of them call the duel. It seems as if they have not decided who won.

“I believe I have won,” Burr calls plainly, hands crossing at the wrists behind his back. He nods smugly to both seconds, who meet his gaze just long enough for the man to move again. Hamilton’s hands rise slowly to the swell of his ribcage. His nimble, brilliant fingers grope from around where his pistol is still held, and-- _Oh. Oh dear god, no._ His hands come away red, shiny slippery red and he falls once more, so unceremoniously, this time forward and onto his knees. Van Ness is suddenly right beside him, and Burr realizes he’s moved forward. His second sticks his arm out in front of him, shakes his head. Burr shoves the arm aside. He will not be kept back now. “I must go and speak to him.”

Burr watches Alexander Hamilton bleed onto the dry ground below him. He does not make a sound, only lies there. For once, Alexander waits. The entire world waits with him. It begins again all at once, Pendleton’s anxious shuffle turning into a sprint and he arrives at Alexander’s side just before he pounds one palm into the ground in front of him, holding himself out of the dust. His other hand still holds the wound.

“Right between the ribs, sir!” Pendleton yells, waving his arm wildly to the doctor. “My man has been hit!” He grips Hamilton by the shoulders, hauls him upright. Even from the distance, Burr can see his eyes loll around aimlessly before focusing weakly. He sighs heavily, his voice soft and non-confrontational. “Ah… My vision is indistinct. Someone retrieve me my glasses. They fell when I was wounded.” He grips pointedly at his gunshot. “And someone take care of that pistol.” He drops it from where he had held it against his body, and it is warm and red, sticky with his life.

The doctor is at his side now, obscuring Burr’s view of him. Pendleton rises to his feet, steely eyes gazing at Burr in what must be quiet fury. He strides back across the field and spits again, this time at the toe of Burr’s boots. “Mr. Vice President,” he almost growls, his mouth curling up in a snarl. “Congratulations. You’ve killed a man with nothing left to lose.”

“He’s not dead,” Burr says almost robotically, his voice monotone and surprisingly unemotional. Pendleton shakes his head fiercely, jerking back towards where Alexander sits in a shallow puddle of his own blood. “He will be. For someone with such poor aim, you must have had some incredible luck.” His last word is hissed, and he turns on his heel and goes back. Burr stands still, looking at Hamilton across the field in what feels like slow motion. He is right. Aaron Burr has won, for the last time.

Burr convinces himself to take one step. He drops his pistol first, because god forbid someone think he was going to finish the job. Hamilton would still survive this. A bullet wound had never killed him before. During the war, he and the Marquis de Lafayette were both shot in the legs and didn’t even notice until the battle was over. Hamilton survived through everything. No God would allow Burr to be the thing that finally killed him.

When Burr finishes his thought, he realizes he’s halfway crossed the dueling grounds. Pendleton and the doctor are still crowded around him, and Burr can’t see his chest rising and falling. Hamilton will not die today, but it panics him to not know if he’s breathing well or not. It wouldn’t kill him, but if he’d punctured a lung he could be choking on his own blood, suffocating on a dusty battlefield from a duel which served no purpose. Burr had convinced himself that this would be for the best, that he and Hamilton had danced on pins and needles for too long for it to not come to this natural head. But if this head causes someone’s pain- someone’s death- Burr will never forgive himself. 

He is close enough now that he can see over the doctor’s shoulders. To his relief, Hamilton’s chest rises and falls, shaky and stuttery but still moving regularly. He is still alive. Burr tries to step closer, but feels himself seized on both sides. Both seconds, his own and Alexander’s are hauling him backwards. Burr struggles forward against their pull, but fear and sadness take all the energy from him. He’s being tugged away when Hamilton’s exhausted eyes peel open again, focusing instantly on Burr. “No, let him stay.” 

His voice is weaker still. Burr feels sadness tug at his insides. As he starts the journey towards him again, Hamilton’s eyes stay trained on him. He smiles to the best of his ability, trying not to cringe for the pain. Burr kneels beside him, the doctor at his right. Hamilton nods when he settles down, his eyes shutting again. “I have no ill will against you, Colonel Burr, let the records show that.” Only now does Burr notice the tears stinging at the backs of his eyes. “Hamilton, I am so sorry.” That’s all he can say before the crying begins. Burr can only remember two other times in his life he’s cried, one being the night his Theodosia passed and once as a child, thinking of the unfairness of his life. He lets them drop, wetting the dirt beside Hamilton’s knee. “I didn’t mean to.” He shakes his head, voice breaking just slightly. He entirely forgets that there are four other men on the field, all bearing witness to his show of emotion. Burr shakes his head again. “Hamilton, I was scared.”

Hamilton struggles, but lifts a hand to rest on his knee. The hand is slightly bloodied, and Burr can almost feel the fabric singe him as it stains. This is the moment that will become his legacy. “All is forgiven, Mr. Burr, sir.” His vague smile fades away, and his body goes lax in the doctor’s arms. “This is the end of me.” He doesn’t say it to Burr this time, but more to himself. The doctor shakes his head. “Pendleton has gone to ready the rowboat. We’ll take you back to your wife and Mrs. Schuyler-Church.”

“My Betsey will be most disappointed in me. And Angelica will likely kill me if the gunshot does not.” His eyes flutter but stay closed, like it would take too much effort to open them. His head lolls to the side, now facing towards Burr. “I am a dead man.” Burr’s skin feels like it’s tightening on him. It feels as if Hamilton has directed the comment to him. He feels a vague pull in his gut, feels like he should apologize again, but is interrupted by someone behind him clearing their throat. Pendleton is there, paling at the sight of blood but still standing tall. “Mr. Hamilton, the boat is prepared. We’ll take you back to New York now.”

“Of course. Someone will need to walk me, I’ve lost a bit of blood-” 

The doctor and Pendleton both slide an arm under his, hauling him up by his shoulders. Burr stays kneeling in the dirt. The space Hamilton vacated is rust colored, bloody, a blank space the size of his thighs surrounded by perfectly round droplets. He can’t tear his eyes away from it. He listens as footsteps trail away from him, still unmoving. He won’t be surprised if he dies someday soon, still sitting in this spot. 

“Have Mr. Burr come with us please.” Burr hears but still doesn’t raise his head. It was said in Hamilton’s voice but quiet enough that he might have imagined it; he’s sure he’s heard Hamilton say it before in their thirty years together. To Washington, perhaps, one of the times he was almost refused to go out into battle. Burr wishes he’d died on the battlefield. He wishes Hamilton had died on the battlefield. Everything, all of this could have been avoided, perhaps if Washington were still alive, he could always keep Hamilton in check-

He lets his eyes drift closed. The crying has given him a headache, it always does, and he can feel the dry trails of tears all across his skin. The image of Hamilton’s blood seeping into the dirt, of his hand gripping the bullet wound, is burned into his eyelids. It is all he sees.

“Vice President, sir, Mr. Hamilton has requested that you accompany us back from Weehawken.” That catches Burr’s attention and he turns, slowly, like the hour hand of a clock creeps forward. “Me?” His voice is different, he notices. Hamilton’s has weakened, grown softer for years of shouting and fighting and dying, and now Burr registers his own as deeper. Like he is sucking the voice from Hamilton’s lips. The metaphor works, he thinks. Burr was born without fight, Hamilton was born with too much. It makes sense for Hamilton to have stolen so much and then lose at his hands.

Pendleton is nodding vigorously, tiresomely, like he’s been doing it for several moments when Burr comes back into himself. Burr steels himself and stands, his legs numb from the long minutes of kneeling. He makes it to Hamilton’s side in only seven steps. He finds himself counting out the paces in his head.

“Mr. Burr. When did your aim become so incredible?” His voice is sparsely above a whisper, more like the memory of what once was. Burr feels his chest swelling with tears again, and his tongue knots in his mouth. He did not mean to shoot Hamilton. He did not aim to kill him. He cannot let him die thinking it was done out of malice. “I didn’t aim for-” he manages before a sob wracks it’s way out of his chest. He has to clap a hand down on his mouth to contain it, his eyes squeezing closed and new tears forming furiously. Hamilton’s brow creases with great difficulty. “Forgive me, then. You cannot blame me for thinking you angry.”

This would be so much easier if Hamilton would pony up and show an ounce of contempt for him. If he’d argue, swear at him, spit on him or curse his name and threaten to have his head. But instead, Hamilton is complacent. He sits loosely, legs barely shuffling, letting himself be dragged along. He crumples into the boat one his arms are released. He shows no fight. He lets himself die.

They hand Burr a paddle and he sits straight and tall at the left side of the boat. His arms are still strong, but his hands have softened from years of desk work. The unfinished wood hurts his hands. He rows harder. Hamilton is behind him, breath rasping. He’s talking, but barely, voice coming and going at random intervals. Most times, his voice comes out a mumbled clump of syllables, but Burr knows exactly what he’s talking about; he’s telling war stories. He’s rambling on about stealing cannons from the British troops, about long nights spent in crowded tents and translating for Von Steuben. Some of his intelligible words are even in French, Burr notices, and he almost smiles. He supposes some things had never left them from their revolutionary days til now.

Hamilton keeps rattling on as they reach the banks of New York. He’s moved on to more intimate tales, ones off the battlefield. He talks about Mulligan, the Marquis, General Washington and Laurens. He trails off into stories about Eliza, but Burr cannot decode much more than that from his jumbled words. They lift him out of the boat and onto shore, standing him up. His chest still moves up and down, shakily. Finally, he hears the words _Yorktown_ and _defeat_ , and then Hamilton takes up a deep breath and quiets. It is so suddenly that Burr finds himself turning and looking at his face, making certain that he is still alive. He is, even if just barely so. Burr still has the secret hope that Hamilton will survive. He knows it is unlikely. He knows every odd is against him. But he knows that if he doesn’t pull through, doesn’t manage to survive, Hamilton won’t be the one to pay for it. Burr will pay in the form of being unable to face his daughter, his clients, unknown faces on the street. This will be his legacy. His legacy will be as a villain.

“Hamilton, sir, would you have Mr. Burr in your house?” This time it is the doctor speaking. Hamilton’s face flickers in no way, not even a twitch, but his head moves in what is best considered to be a nod. Pendleton scowls, but moves his arm from the front of Hamilton’s coat to open the door and allow him in. Burr enters, in a dream. He’s been to the estate before, but not since they moved after Philip’s death. This house is larger, cleaner, echoes and empty feeling even with the gaggle of children Burr knows Hamilton has. Somewhere in a faroff room, there is laughter. From down a different hall is dissonant piano. From up the stairs, someone screams.

Burr does not know her personally, but recognizes this woman as Angelica Schuyler-Church, one of Eliza’s sisters. She’s made vague appearances throughout his interactions with the family, always confining herself to the background and tightlipped smiles. Now, she is none of these things, sobbing openly and screaming and calling for Eliza. The music has stopped. The laughter has also stopped. All the world is ripping, tearing open inside his head, clicking footsteps as Eliza comes to the noise. She is at the top of the steps, gown fanning around her in a ghostlike way when she stops and the fabric keeps running.

She does not react in the way Burr expects. She stops short of the final step, eyes wide. They fill with tears, but she does not cry. She breathes deep, the sound almost louder than her sister’s scream. Angelica notices the change in the room’s atmosphere a moment too late, her shrill noises ringing down the hall even after she’s closer her mouth. A whimper slides from her lips. Eliza’s hands tremble as she folds them before her. “Mr. Pendleton,” she says, voice soft. “Please tend to the children, sir. They’re in the day room, go to them.” Pendleton nods as if he understands, heels tapping together as he snaps into attention for just a moment before bolting from the room. Eliza’s demeanor does not crack. Her voice stays steady. “Let us take him to our bed. He needs to rest.”

Burr and the doctor comply, hauling Hamilton up the grand staircase with much difficulty. Hamilton’s chest still moves, as do his legs, but both efforts are in vain. He can no longer stand himself up.

When he is secure in his own bed, the doctor steps away for just a moment, recounting the tale to the women as Alex lies still, loose-limbed and still in his bloodstained vest. Burr doesn’t face toward the doctor, cannot tear his eyes off the torn flesh of Hamilton’s chest. Still, he can sense their harsh stares from the vague prickling feeling in the back of his neck. He knows they blame him for it. He blames himself. He should’ve turned the pistol on his own ribcage. It would have been far more just.

“Alexander?” There is a whisper from behind him, and he turns to see Eliza approaching. She does not look angry. She also doesn’t look sad. She seems indifferent to her husband’s death, until her hand reaches his face. The gentle slide of her delicate fingers on his skin seems to release Hamilton from his trance, and his eyes pull open slowly. She smiles, the unmoving tears still seated along the line of her eyelashes. “Can you hear me, darling?” His tongue pokes out very slightly, and it runs across his lips to wet them. “Yes, my dearest Betsey.” His voice is just as strained if not more so than before. Burr feels the pull of sadness in himself again. He feels like if he tried to speak, he’d choke on it.

“Pray tell you found my letters. To you, and Angelica and the children.” His eyes are visibly cloudy. His hands are still stained with blood. He will die soon. Eliza nods. “You shouldn’t have gone this morning, Alexander. I forgive you, but-” She breaks off when her voice cracks, betraying her sadness. She shakes her head. Hamilton’s breathing catches in his throat. “I feel it wrong to say my goodbyes, when I’ve already written them to you.” He takes a long moment to sit still, his chest no longer moving in a rehearsed pattern. It takes too long to fall again. “I might ask you to simply sit here with me. A final moment of peace.” Eliza’s lower lip trembles. She nods. The world goes silent again.

The only noise in the room for long, dragging minutes has been Hamilton’s breathing. It is still unsteady, still wavering and unsure like his lungs think each drag of oxygen will be their last. Burr stands vacantly by the door and watches. The doctor has already tried to stop the bleeding and failed. He tried to remove the bullet and failed. All that is left to do is wait.

“Mr. Burr. Join me at my bedside, please.” His voice is stronger, like the moments of not speaking have helped to replenish it. It is still weak. He takes great pauses between every word. Burr steps closer to his side, hand brushing the soft edge of the bedclothes. This feels fairly wrong to him. He should have been the one to lose in the duel. It isn’t fair or right. Hamilton’s head rolls toward him once more. He doesn’t find the strength to close his jaw when it lolls open, breathing through it heavily. His harsh pants fill the room again. “Burr,” he begins, and takes in another gulp of air like he intends to continue but is cut short by a harsh coughing fit. He coughs until it seems to echo in his throat, and Burr is vaguely aware of Eliza slipping away to grab him a handkerchief. She presses it into his hand and Hamilton accepts, struggling to lift it to his mouth. Eliza helps to lift his arm, and he coughs into it twice and pulls it away bloody. Angelica begins to sob again.

“Mr. Burr I assure you that I do not hold a grudge. I might, but even if I did I have not the energy left. So here we are.” Burr nods. He does not believe it. He does not want forgiveness. He wants Hamilton to hate him, for christ's sakes, he’s killed him. He wants all of them to hate him, to never forgive him, to ridicule him and exile him and take away his status as Jefferson’s Vice President. He doesn’t care to work for the man anyway. He doesn’t care to work in a world without Hamilton somewhere in it.

“I forgive you, Burr. The question is, will you forgive yourself?”

He turns his head again, away from his crowd of spectators. He coughs more, produces more blood from within his mouth. His empty hand is still clutching uselessly at his wound. His fingernails dig into the fabric of his waistcoat, exhausting the final energy he has. He holds it like his existence depends on it. He squeezes his eyes shut tighter with the effort. His shoulders heave, he gives another cough, and his body goes lax with a final shudder of breath. His chest falls and does not rise again. Alexander Hamilton has died.

It all feels very anticlimactic. Nothing truly changes save for the absence of one steady breathing in the room. The walls stay in tact. The floor does not crumble away. The sun is still rising over New York City. Burr isn’t sure what he expected, but something more. Something more than silence. He waits for something incredible to happen, but realizes too late that something incredible ending does not simply mean the rise of a new thing. Hamilton’s death will not be a phoenix. Nothing beautiful will be borne of this fire.

There are footsteps on the stairs, in the hall outside, far too quickly and almost threatening in the quietness of the room. Pendleton arrives in the doorway to see Hamilton still in his bed. He stops immediately. His head droops between his shoulders and for a moment, Burr could mistake him as the dead man.

Hamilton is Pendleton’s friend, he thinks. Everyone in this room loved Hamilton in life, is still standing here to love him in death. Eliza loves him as a wife. Angelica, as a sister. The doctor as a patient and Pendleton as a friend. He is not certain what he himself is doing here by a dead man’s bedside. He takes a small step back, sure to not let his heel click the tiled floor. He backs his way all the way to the wall, then along to the edge of the doorway.

“Mr. Burr?”

Eliza breaks the silence, her eyes somehow managing to move away from her dead beloved. Her body shifts with each syllable, her brow furrowing and lips pursing. Things she does are already reminding Burr of Hamilton. He stares back in response, still keeping one eye on Hamilton. In case he were to sit back up.

“Aaron, sir, I hope I wouldn’t be rude to ask you to stay a bit. Perhaps rest. I can’t imagine you slept well last night.” She does not care to tack on the implied part, about how will he ever sleep now that he has the permanent image of shooting and carrying and ultimately killing this man.

Burr killed people in the war. He killed carefully, precisely, personally. He’d been full of vigor and want for the fight, even if he were more reserved than other recruits. This is very different. This is one he had not wanted to do himself.

He finds himself nodding, escorted down the empty hall to a clear room with nothing in it but a bed. Eliza gestures him to it and he goes, but once he sits he faces the wall that the room shares with Hamilton’s. Eliza watches him, pain in her eyes. She still does not cry. She leaves.

Hamilton met Aaron Burr on a crisp cold day in mid-October. He was a bright eyed young man, long dark hair tied back in a ragged strip of leather. He’d chased Burr down the street, shouting, bouncing off of wooden carts and men on their horses, barreling through a line of British troops all arm in arm. He recognised Burr from others’ descriptions, he said he’s a bit of a legend back at King’s College. Hamilton had registered, requested the speedy route and to finish his studies in two years but was denied. Apparently, some man named James Madison had tried it the year after Aaron and nearly lost his head. Hamilton was full of anger, full of life and full of dreams. Ready to die for a country that was not his to die for. Ready to die to make a better tomorrow.

Hamilton had told him once, when they’d slept back to back in the desert-like heat of the battlefield, that he had been ready to die since he was fourteen. When the fever didn’t kill him, the hurricane should’ve. When the hurricane didn’t, the long boat ride should have. When even that didn’t, Hamilton was sure that the starting of the revolution would also bring about death. He’d said something more poetic, Burr is certain. His tongue had always had a neater way of wrapping around his words.

Hamilton was his friend. Hamilton is his friend. A strained, unhealthy friendship but a friendship, still. It should not have ended this way. Burr knows now why he sits unmoving in a vacant bedroom; he did love Hamilton. He loved him in the way a man loves the moon for rising. One does not long for the moon, or wish to hold it, but if it were to ever cease to rise, a deep, unsettled feeling would flutter down in his chest and he would never shake it again.

Burr closes his eyes. Perhaps, when he reopens them, Hamilton will be standing before him, arms open and awaiting embrace.

**Author's Note:**

> aaaa i wrote something!!! i'm working on lots of other stuff so if you like this ??? stay tuned ???? thank you so much for reading my thing aa
> 
> (catch me on tumblr @ aaronnburrsir)


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